


A Lifetime of Mistakes

by raleighpuppy



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Implied/Referenced Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-23
Updated: 2014-06-23
Packaged: 2018-02-05 20:16:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1830937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raleighpuppy/pseuds/raleighpuppy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Pitfall, Herc shows up on Scott's doorstep in the rain with a single suitcase, red-rimmed eyes, and a bulldog.</p><p>A reflection on the lives of the Hansen brothers and the mistakes they've made.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Lifetime of Mistakes

**Author's Note:**

> Rape is only mentioned briefly, and only the methods of suicide are mentioned. Neither one of them is described in any sort of depth.

     The war was over. For everyone except Herc, that is. He'd never had a break from some sort of war. Before his war was an absent father and a young mother trying to do her best, which turned into joining the RAAF. Later, his war was against the kaiju and the fact Angela was gone and he had no idea what to do with himself. Now, it was over Chuck's death and the fact he wasn't needed for anything anymore. War as all he was ever good for.

     Herc thought about the fact he was no longer needed as he stood on one of the higher balconies of the Shatterdome and for the first time in a very long time, considered throwing himself off of it. But then he realized Max would have no one, and that he promised Chuck he'd take care of him. His only reason for living was a dog that would be gone in a couple more years anyway.

     And that was why, after the closing of the Hong Kong Shatterdome and the shutdown of the PPDC, Herc stood on a doorstep in the rain with his arm in a sling, a single suitcase, red-rimmed eyes, and a confused bulldog. He knocked on the door a couple times. Finally, someone answered. A ginger, a few years younger than Herc, but taller, answered the door and frowned.

"Hey Scottie..."

     Scott opened the door and let him in, even though they hadn't ended on the best of terms. Scott had raped a young woman. He was drunk and so was she, and at the time he thought that was an excuse. He'd realized it far too late for an apology to mean anything to anyone. Herc saw it in the drift. He saw it and didn't know what to do. He panicked, just like Scott knew he would because he had a habit of panicking.

     When they were kids, Herc would panic a lot. Loud noises scared him, made him jump, so no one expected him to join the RAAF and to work on planes, which are pretty damn loud, of all things. But he wanted to do it. He wanted to fix planes. According to someone Scott had talked to a long time ago, Herc cried when he got his first plane to fix. He'd also cried when Chuck was born. Scott hadn't seen him cry in a long time, but his eyes were red-rimmed now and Scott didn't know what to do.

     He didn't know what to do because the only memory he had of their dad, Donovan, involved him crying. He'd shot his brains out that night after a fight with their mum. He'd been cheating, but thought she was in the wrong. Their mum didn't like to talk about it. When they dad died, Tess was left with two boys to take care of herself and a piece of her missing. She didn't want either of her two boys to end up a drunk asshole like their father.

     So, Herc tried too hard to be good and ended up stressing himself out. He was too scared, their grandmother would say. He was too scared of messing up because he didn't want to end up like Donovan. Tess would just say it took years to end up like that, and that Herc didn't have it in him. He'd mumble and not meet peoples' eyes for a long time after their dad died. And Scott didn't care anymore. He'd accepted the fact half of him came from Donovan and that he was going to be a fuck-up in the end. He was too brave, their grandmother would say. Tess would just say she knows, and that it was a shame.

     Scott knew he fucked up a lot. He knew he was an awful kid, but he'd never say it out loud. He was an awful son and brother and uncle. Herc thought he fucked up a lot. He thought he was an awful son and brother and husband and father. When all Herc had tried to do was save others. But Scott didn't think Herc was meant to be a hero to his family. It came with the name Hercules, he thought, because Hercules saved everyone else and killed his family, and Herc screamed at him to be quiet.

     And, as Scott thought about all of this as he looked at Herc standing on his doorstep in the rain, he wondered when it all changed. He had no earthly idea when Herc stopped mumbling and met peoples' eyes and when he met Angela. He had no idea when he became so much like Donovan and oh my god he wanted to die because the last thing he ever wanted to be was Donovan.

     One time Herc saw Donovan hit their mum, and Scott thinks that was why Herc was so uneasy for a very, very long time. There was something about seeing his father, someone who was supposed to protect them, last out like that. Scott had hit Herc in Lucky's con-pod. He'd ripped off his helmet after Herc saw the rape and started to panic, leaving Herc to carry the neutral load alone, and physically attacked him while there was nothing he could do about it.

     Scott didn't think Herc had ever hit Angela or touched her without permission. He'd know if he had. He would have seen it in the drift and felt the shame too. He did know from the drift that Herc didn't know what to do with Chuck because their own father wasn't the best example. He wasn't an example at all. He wasn't there.

     Herc played the violin at Donovan's funeral. He was very good at playing, but he hadn't played since Angela died because she loved it a lot and it made him too sad. He didn't cry at Donovan's funeral as he played. But some sick relative of theirs, someone from Donovan's father's side of the family, took a ton of pictures of Herc standing by the grave with his violin and of Tess hugging her sons. Herc broke his violin into small pieces after Angela died. He buried them.

     Scott didn't want to be another Donovan. He didn't want Herc to hate him or to play the violin at his funeral with no tears. He felt himself drowning in all his mistakes, as Herc stood five feet away and wanted to die. Herc didn't want to go out the same way as Donovan, but he'd tried it before. It hadn't worked. Now, it seemed like his only option. Scott realized he was crying and that Herc was crying too. The two of them hugged for the first time in a very long time.

"Herc, you can always come in."

**Author's Note:**

> i frickin made myself cry writing this


End file.
